The Urbanization of Western Siberia: A Historian’s View

Abstract

This article is devoted to studying the main trends in the historical process of urbanization of Western Siberia across several centuries, right up until the mid-twentieth century. We locate the emergence of the first settlements in the region now known as Western Siberia and present the process of their gradual transformation into urban settlements. We determine the most important socioeconomic prerequisites for urbanization in the region, as well as the starting point of urbanization. We identify the features of urbanization in the region and, at different stages of its historical development, reveal the specific qualities of formation of a network of cities in the region, the impact of the “Stolypin” settlements on the process of urban population growth, and the influence of Russian capital, particularly the construction of the Great Siberian Railway, in the development of that urban network. We illustrate the features of Siberian urbanization during the years of Civil War and New Economic Policy and direct considerable attention to the causes and factors of forced urban growth during the years of Stalinist modernization. We show that accelerated industrialization became the basis for a fundamentally new phenomenon in the history of Siberian urbanization, so-called “quasi-urbanization.”

Keywords:

• city
• population
• urbanization
• quasi-urbanization
• settlement
• social infrastructure

Notes

1. Statisticheskie tablitsy o sostoianii gorodov Rossiiskoi imperii, sostavlenye v Statisticheskom otdelenii Soveta Ministerstva vnutrennikh del. (St. Petersburg, 1840), pp. 14, 48, 49.

2. Naselennye mesta Rossiiskoi imperii v 500 i bolee zhitelei s ukazaniem vsego nalichnogo v nikh naseleniia i chisla zhitelei preobladaiushchikh veroispovedanii po dannym Pervoi vseobshchei perepisi naseleniia 1897 g. (St. Petersburg, 1905), pp. 57, 64, 73, 74, 82.

3. Naselennye mesta Rossiskoi imperii …, p. 66.

4. Pervaia vseobshchaia perpepis’ naseleniia 1897 g., Vol. 1: Obshchii svod rezul’tatov dannykh Pervoi vseobshchei perepisi naseleniia, proizvedennoi 25 ianvaria 1897 g. (St. Petersburg, 1905), pp. 1, 3, 5, and Vol. 2: Aziatskaia Rossiia (St. Petersburg, 1914), pp. 86–87; Statisticheskii ezhegodnik Rossii. 1914 g. (Petrograd, 1915), otd. 1, pp. 33–57.

5. Statisticheskii ezhegodnik Rossii. 1914 g., otd. 1, pp. 33–57.

6. Statisticheskii ezhegodnik 1918–1920 gg., first edition (Moscow, 1920), pp. 2, 4.

7. Biulleten’ Tsentral’nogo statisticheskogo upravleniia. Vserossiiskaia gorodskaia perepis’ 1923 goda, no. 77, August 25, 1923 (Moscow, 1923), pp. 6–7.

8. Naselenie SSSR (chislennost’, sostav i dvizhenie naseleniia). 1973. Statisticheskii sbornik (Moscow, 1975), pp. 16–19; Naselenie Rossii za 100 let (1897–1987). Statisticheskii sbornik (Moscow, 1998), p. 52.

9. Vsesoiuznaia perepis’ naseleniia 1926 goda, vol. VI (Moscow, 1928), pp. 8–10.

10. Vsesoiuznaia perepis’ naseleniia 1926 goda, vol. VI, pp. 8–10.

11. Sibirskii krai. Statisticheskii sbornik (Novosibirsk, 1930), pp. 4–15.

12. Sibirskii krai, pp. 4–15.

13. Naselenie SSSR, pp. 16, 18.

14. Naselenie SSSR, pp. 16, 18.

15. Kuzbass. In Rezul’taty perepisi gorodskogo naseleniia 1931 g. (Novosibirsk, 1931), p. xviii.

16. State Archive of Novosibirskaia Oblast (GANO), f. 47, op. 5, d. 208, l. 73.

17. GANO, f. 47, op. 5, d. 208, l. 73.

18. Sotsialisticheskoe stroitel’stvo RSFSR, 1936 (Moscow, 1937), pp. 204–205, 206–207.

19. State Archive of Kemerovskaia Oblast, f. p-15, op. 8, d. 19, l. 18–19.